


(dead man) blood filling up our boots

by Ambikai



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Biting, Character Turned Into Vampire, Dubious Consent, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-13
Updated: 2015-01-13
Packaged: 2018-03-07 09:26:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3169787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ambikai/pseuds/Ambikai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the realm of the Woodland King, Bard is born again six feet under on a starry night. He hungers for blood, sleeps in the day, and cannot stand it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	(dead man) blood filling up our boots

**Author's Note:**

  * For [extryn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/extryn/gifts).



> An attempt to mix vampires into Tolkien's world. So an AU but the setting is mostly the same. I hope you guys enjoy it!

-

They say the Woodland King was desperate to fill his empty heart with trinkets. They say trinkets of gold, precious gems, and rare texts, are what filled his stone palace in the depths of Mirkwood. He was as bad as the dwarves of Moria who mined too deep, of Thror’s folk who summoned dragons when they took and took from the mountain core. Some say he was worse, as his treasure was stolen, all of it, and that he would steal you if you entered his realm.

They say the Woodland King had an empty heart and that he hungered to fill it.

But of course the Woodland King wasn’t real, just a story to scare children from straying off the forest path.

-

It took him five seconds to rip open the throat, swallowing the scream. The veins spilled sweetness onto his tongue, and he drank himself into a state, marring the body, bloody bites marks as the heart gave in, trying to get it all. Sweet, so sweet.

He should stop, he needed to stop, this wasn’t right. Stop.

Thick, heady, copper, and so warm was the blood: his skin growing flushed, dead pallor seeping away. His eyes, before dull, twinkled with uncertain darkness. He was alive, and sitting amongst a torn up man, hands in entrails as he ripped at the heart, fangs sharp.

He should stop, he needed to right now – _stop, stop, stop_ – a raw howl ripped from him for only a second, dry sobs as he licked at the cooling blood on the forest floor. He wanted more of it. He wasn’t done yet. He needed more. Why wasn’t there _more_? He glanced around, looking up and down; there had to more, he needed it, growls rumbling through him. _Where?_

Thranduil’s hand fell on his shoulder, minimal pressure, but he stopped, froze, turning to look at his maker (father, lord, king), breath heavy. Thranduil’s smile was kind, not cruel, and he allowed his maker to lick his face clean of blood, eyes closed and hands reaching for silken cloth.

“Why, what a mess you make,” said Thranduil, pulling him into an embrace.

“I feel so warm,” he said, eyes still closed so he didn’t have to look, body shivering.

Thranduil hummed, wrapping him closer. “You did so well, Bard, so very well,”

It clicked then that he was Bard, but that’s all; the rest was still blank.

-

When memories did whisper at his conscious mind, he saw fire (burning deep in his flesh), felt ice water (choking as it sucked the breath from his lungs) consuming him, his skin blistering, wood splintering around him. He cannot remember the screaming, hands reaching in to grab him without purchase before being pulled away. The vague understanding of lying there: half-dead sinking in wreckage. He cannot quite believe it had occurred, maybe it hadn’t.

-

He awakened in darkness, inhaling dirt and ash, scrambling to get out. He gagged, trying to move, heavy damp dirt filling space. He was buried alive, six feet under, blunt nails digging. His heart didn’t race, and his body didn’t flood with adrenaline. It was wrong, wrong, what if he never got out, what if he was in so deep under the – no.

The moment he broke the surface he gasped for unneeded air, spitting, crawling across the forest floor, blinking dirt from his eyes. His throat was burning, not unlike when fever had took him as a child of nine, headspace floating. It took him longer than it should (he learnt later that Tauriel had been initially more perceptive, sitting in awe of starlight, listening to crickets and the wind whispering through leaves), but finally he sinks, rolls, looking upwards, and through the tall trees he sees the silver golden stars, twinkling somewhere very far away.

“What are they called?”

He wondered if he could climb up the tallest branch, reach out, touch, and understand. His eyes tracking from the roots to the trunks to the branches, to the leaf veins as they moved in motion, framing the night.

“They have many names.”

He turned sharply, snarling. A tall, pale man stood three feet away, on his white gold head a crown of berries and autumn leaves, piercing eyes holding him in measure. His own eyes seemed to click, focusing on the skin pores, the delicate tip of his ears, the fine embroidery on the man’s coat: a stitch needed to be threaded, pulled in.

The man smiled, showing fang.

In a single moment he saw how he could move away, go low to the ground, make himself small, present his neck, keep his eyes down. All of the things to make himself not a threat, to make himself safe, animal instinct, submit to the dominant predator.

He stood up, growling.

A second passed, and he saw it all. He couldn’t stop it. There was something inherently graceful, the way moonlight and darkness weaved in fluid motion. There was a hand around his throat, the man pushing him down, straddling him, long fine white-golden hair falling over him. They hold each other’s gaze, the man’s smile soft as he continued to softly growl, low rumbles vibrating in his chest.

More pressure was applied to his throat. He didn’t need to breathe, but those elegant hands could snap. He swallowed deep, his throat raw, trembling.

“What are you called?” he asked, letting himself sink into the ground, forcing each limb to relax under the weight. The grip lessened after several moments.

“Thranduil,”

“Thranduil,” he repeated, tasting the starlight, “Thranduil.”

There were many things he was desperate to ask: who, what, why, how, when. Variations on each whirled just out of reach. He rolled his tongue, ran it along pointed teeth, swallowed. He settled on one.

“What am I?”

“My fledgling,”

He didn't know what the meant.

“Thranduil, why is my throat burning?”

“You are thirsty.”

With that Thranduil’s left his throat, standing, and he extended his hand to to help him up. He considered not, for the briefest moment, but took hold. They stood chest to chest, before Thranduil placed his hand on his shoulder, guiding him through the forest. The questions from before manifested, him breathing deep, considering where to pick up the thread.

Then he smelt _it_ , and _it_ got very messy.

-

His throat hadn’t burned since his first night, but it was a matter of time.

He ran his tongue over his fangs most hours.

Thranduil and he exchanged bite for bite. He wasn’t sure if this was sexual or platonic, everything haywire. He was fairly sure it was sexual, or at least a way to dominate him. Thranduil’s bites were deep, made him ache; his own light, unsure, testing, and suckling.

Thranduil had a tendency to keep him close. He noticed it when the others came near and Thranduil moved between him and them. At first he hadn’t ( _couldn’t of_ ) noticed as his focus shifted from bloodied hands and teeth to the wondrous tiny details of the world, sitting by leaf and flower under starlight, tracing their form in reverence. He supposed in the early days, had been ordered not to bother, even though their language was foreign, strange, unknown, and lyrical in syntax.

He wanted to learn, Thranduil said soon.

One of them had spoken to him though, her footsteps lighter, less practiced than his maker. Her scent was a mixture of rust and wildflowers, ginger hair in loose braids, thinnest smile and wide eyes watching him from above as he had sat by a waterfall, tracking his hand through water droplets that fell on sharp rocks. She had been tense as if she expected him to attack. Maybe he would? He couldn’t win against Thranduil, something about him made Bard bend, but from this one there was potential, weighing it up.

“How long have you been there?”

His sense of time and perception was shot, the only time it fell on exact beat was when Thranduil pressed them together, hand on hip, guiding him through this underground palace that replicated forest, mighty stone trunks and weaving roots suspended, empty dead halls with dust for garden.

She relaxed, thin smile growing. “I just got here – you’re strangely perceptive. It took me days to stop staring,”

“Days?” He blinked; it had been _days_ surely?

“Ninety six hours in fact,” she said, “How are you finding it? Has your throat started burning again?”

He swallowed away the corpse creeping on his thoughts. “No.”

“The second time is harder,”

“Why?”

“Awareness, perception,” she stopped listing, looking despondent at memory, “But he’ll get you through it,”

“So Thranduil made you this?”

She nodded. “He thought he was being kind,”

“You thought he was being selfish?”

She paused, mulling over words. “Selfish … is the wrong word. Those fairy tales they told you as a child? You came from the lake, yes? The Woodland King? It has some truth … I suppose …”

“Tauriel, _kela_.”

They both jumped. Thranduil stepped in suddenly, placing himself between Bard and her, eyes hard. Tauriel stiffened, head bowed. They spoke, and in clear dismissal Tauriel left.

Watching that exchange made the monster rear itself. He _came from the lake_ , _when he was a child_ … when he had first awoke it had been burning desire to know, and that had swapped into knowing his life now, not what it had been. Ninety six hours, four days.

“Is isolation a common technique?” he practically snarled.

“Sorry?”

“Isolation. Keeping me in darkness,” his voice grew in volume, “You cannot – why did you choose me for this? What purpose? I want –“

“Patience, Bard,”

_“Patience.”_

“I think it’s time for your bedtime,”

“I think it’s time for me to leave.”

Thranduil at that looked livid, fangs elongated, and his hand caught Bard by the throat, pushing him against rock. They wrestled, Bard swiping at his feet and briefly catching Thranduil off guard and pushing. They tumbled into water and Bard pushed up trying to use the stones as leverage as Thranduil held him under. His lungs are drowned; he can feel the water deeply there. He rocked against him, but he was caught in iron.

Memory seeped. He was burning and frozen, water in his lungs, and they are screaming for him, tiny hands being pulled back from, faces (Sigrid, grim-face, bundling supplies and leading them to the boat; Tilda with wide eyes, despaired with knowing as he went off; Bain, brave Bain staring at him, trusting him) – he’s pulled out thrown onto the rocks. A great roar and gleaming devil eyes in fire and smoke stalk towards him. Shivers wrecked him, and everything was spilling as he coughed water.

Bard was pulled in against Thranduil. He made a feeble attempt to fight it, but Thranduil mouthed at his throat, stilling him.

Thranduil spoke low, so low, a whisper. “I know you don’t like this. I know you want to know. But you need to wait. You need to stay with me. You are too out of control, too angry. Who knows who you might hurt?”

His hands are in entrails, and he’s back with the corpse.

_“The second time is harder, but he’ll get you through it,”_

They sat like that for a time, and then he felt Her. The sun was coming, and She, as Bard had learnt from burning flesh, held no love. Thranduil seemed less bothered by Her, more annoyed, forcing Bard under blankets in a pitch-black room, licking at his wounds.

“Come now, Bard,”

He nodded, dumb, and followed Thranduil, at a lost of where else he would go: memory was still distant, everything ripped, trying to knit itself together.

“There has to be another way,”

Thranduil sighed.

-

With the sun setting, he rose. He was swaddled in too many silks and furs while Thranduil sat beside him, reading. He needed the layers, his body cooled too quickly. It was even colder today and he wondered if that was the swim yesterday, if the swim yesterday had made his throat ache and his head afloat.

“Memories are powerful,” said Thranduil, lightly. He looked down at Bard, “They can leave one lost.”

He nosed into the covers, pressing against Thranduil’s thigh. “I had children,” he mumbled, “Do I still have children?”

He looked up, and Thranduil closed his own eyes. “They were lost,”

“Why didn’t you stop it?”

“My people have lost so much, Bard. And I am not a fool. These halls used to be so full, before this shadow infected us, forbade us from fading or sailing into the West.”

He knew the stories of the old Elven lords and ladies, the first and wisest beings in Middle-Earth who after the Great War fled, not to be seen again. Except here, _these halls used to be so full_ , corrupted and hungering for blood.

His throat tightened, and swallowing did nothing. “If life is so dark, why inflict this upon me? _Why not let me die with them?_ ”

“Because we have work to do. The Shadow may be gone, but his taint lingers. It is a small price that we must consume the blood of Eru’s second born to keep them safe from other enemies,”

 _“Do not stray off the forest path, or the Woodland King will take you,”_ whispered Bard, a forgotten warning from his mother when she had sent him with men to trade in the town beyond the forest that lay under the shadow of the mountains as a lad.

Thranduil chuckled. “Yes, apt. Though there are worse things than me. An untrained fledging for example,”

Bard grimaced.

“Patience and practice, and it will become better,” said Thranduil.

“When I have _practice_ will you let me leave?” He disliked the word, _practice_. Taking human lives, _practice_. He spat it out.

Thranduil didn’t answer him, instead moving to stroke his hair, feather light, lulling Bard. He allowed it, eyes closing.

“If I were to let you leave where would you go?”

“The lake,”

The hand stopped, and Bard cracked an eye open.

“I am not a trinket, a prize,”

“And I am not a childhood boogie man to keep you,” said Thranduil abruptly, “But you will find only pain and death there. The lake burned,”

“How can I know that if I stay here?”

Once again he wasn’t answered but the petting resumed. It was nice, to the effect of soothing him: those clever long fingers making him almost forget the burn, letting his loose head sink. But no, he needed to know. He turned his head away, pushing himself out, the air cold to flesh.

“Thranduil, answer me.”

“I fear there is little I can do to truly stop you, Bard,” Thranduil shook his head, moving out of bed, “But in the meantime, you must feed,”

“I’m not hungry,”

“I’m not giving you an option,”

Thranduil pulled Bard with him, leading him from the highest room down into the depths where he could hear the underground river running, moving away into the forest to the lake ( _home_ ). The torches had just been lit, and he could see shadowed figures moving away as they approached.

Each step his head got lighter and lighter, and he wanted to bury his head against Thranduil, and stop. His throat was raw. He knew where he was being led, knew because every now and then he had caught the scent: warmth, rust, blood.

They reached the bottom, passing armoured guards with blank expressions, and Thranduil moved behind him, stroking his arms, moving a hand to rest on his belly. Bard tilted his head back, letting the elder mouth, teasing where his jugular slowly pumped stolen blood.

“Can’t I just drink from you?”

Bard melted as Thranduil nosed at his earlobe. “As enticing as that is: no,”

He was edged towards a cell. His body wasn’t deadweight but he was slow. He knew what was coming, could smell the breath and fear through the iron doors. Humans. Food. What he had been. What he maybe was. He didn’t feel completely _other_. He stopped breathing, unwilling to scent the air like a dog in heat. The cell door clicked open and he was moved in.

A quick glance told him it was empty but in that glance thick manacles were attached to both hands, keeping him chained.

“You aren’t leaving me here alone,”

“No,” said Thranduil, gesturing at the door.

Two guards came in, between them a struggling woman, blindfolded, gagged, and dirt covered. They moved her to the opposite side, within reach still, chaining her up. Thranduil’s hand on his hip, as light as it was, kept him in place.

“Patience and practice,” he said, echo, senseless repeat, “She’s chained,”

“Clearly,” Thranduil turned to him, “Hunting moving prey would sway your heart. Here you will learn the necessity of death for life, and then when you are ready you will learn to hunt. Baby steps.”

The look he got was not pity, and he couldn’t decipher it. It was brief, and then he was alone with the woman.

They had removed her blindfold.

He could feel the blood pumping, quicker in her fear, her sweet tang marinated in sweat. Her eyes were full of tears, and she was pressed against the wall as if to get away from him. Not that she could – the cell was four feet by four feet and he had plenty of reach. Even with his hands in chains he could use them. He felt the chains were more symbolic.

She was screaming through the gag.

He sat himself down, squeezing his eyes shut. What if she was a criminal, she was in chains, what if she had done something terrible. Murdered her children, drowned them. None of that felt right, none of that sat right. His head pounded, twitching neck muscle to shake the burn. She could be a good person. She could be. He opened his eyes.

If he could just bite, could just bite down, and take only a small amount.

It was the longest night, but knowing that when day broke it wouldn’t matter where he was, sleep would take him.

-

He woke to Thranduil, of course, his silver-blond haired jailer crowding him, holding him. His skin was frozen, and the shivers deep. The woman was still there: he could smell her, hear her breath, the half-dried blood on her wrists from tugging at her chains during the day seducing against the scent of sweat and piss.

“No.”

“Bard,”

“Just tell me she’s guilty, just tell me,” he hadn’t opened his eyes; he doubted he would.

“You are neither king, neither judge, or jury,” said Thranduil, “You are an animal, stripped to your base. This is our path now, Bard. In the end it doesn’t matter if she is guilty or innocent – she is food. A drink to quench,”

Bard’s throat was massaged, lightly, each press sending stabbing sawdust pain. He moved his chin down, curling in to prevent access.

“What troubles you most about this?” asked Thranduil, “Don’t say you don’t know what she’s done. You know that’s irrelevant to her fate. So why can’t you just bite down? What stops you?”

“Did you do this to Tauriel?”

Thranduil tutted. “Don’t avoid the question, Bard,”

“Did you do this to Tauriel?”

“If you must know her guilt came later in life. She, I kept under watch for different reasons to you,” said Thranduil, “Now answer my question, Bard,”

“I don’t know, I don’t know,”

“Look at her and tell me,"

Eyes met eyes. Her eyes were bloodshot, now dry and no more tears to come. He couldn’t cry anymore.

“Her eyes,”

He should have realised that Thranduil would do this. He gripped into Thranduil, and then the two guards from before, were on him, holding him back as he strained to stop it. They held him flush against the wall, as Thranduil grasped her head.

He pressed his fingers deep, dry eyes crying blood.

It broke the seal, and god he wanted it. No. Yes. His mouth was open, inhaling, throwing himself forward, and getting nowhere. He didn’t want this, wanted to lick her face, rip her throat. No, he didn’t want this. His tongue snaked out, tasting the bloodied air.

“Is this better, Bard?”

He cannot muster the words, biting down on his tongue to sway his hunger, whimpering ‘monster, monster, please, please’. The pleas growing louder as Thranduil begun to drink. He wanted it so bad, needed relief, thick and heavy trickling down his throat.

When it was over, they let him go, taking the body. Thranduil leaned over him, and he couldn’t help himself but be embraced. He was so hungry, so cold, it all hurt, his words lost.

“We will try again tomorrow,”

He was left to sink into shivering sleep.

-

When Thranduil said stop, it was difficult to unlatch, mouth full of thick blood, eyes wide and body warmed. No, it was impossible to let go. He was so hungry still. The order kept coming, again and again. He wanted to obey, and he wanted to stop now. The heartbeat was too slow, the boy’s struggles half-forgotten.

His jaw was dislocated, and he was thrown to the other side of the room.

Snap, the boy’s neck cracked under Thranduil’s beautiful hands.

“How could you?” he said much later, jaw back in place though tender. He couldn’t be stand to be wrapped again in embrace, so they had reached a stand still, him in the corner, curled in around himself, head ache gone, belly full.

“He would’ve died anyway. I merely sped up the process.”

-

Another body drained.

He was straddled by Thranduil, bucking up, hips rolling, mouth bloodied, eyes in a drunk haze.

“Control, control, Bard. You obey me, yes? When I say stop, **stop** ”

“Yes, yes, yes, _please_ , _please, please_ ,"

-

Fifth time was the charm.

Thranduil led him out of the dark, pleased.

None of them had been guilty, had merely made a wrong turn. That was what Thranduil told him as his body was washed in lotions and running water. This way though he didn’t have to decide, didn’t have to complicate matters by playing jury, judge, or king. A small part hoped he was being lied to, as Thranduil dressed him in simple robes, leading him to the throne room.

There he sunk to his knees, pledged allegiance as others watched on.

-

Fairy tales are merely cautionary tales, tips and life lessons simplified for children. The Woodland King was something simple though. The Woodland King would take you; keep you in his underground forest palace. You may not know why but that hardly mattered. Was it to fill his empty heart?

Bard couldn’t say.

-

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much for reading!


End file.
